Biljana Ciric, the curator of the exhibition invited individuals who visited the exhibition in Guangzhou to write and a share a description:

Project #1: Repetition as a gesture towards deep listening

Thinking and practicing how we could allow someone distant and not physically present to encounter exhibition, to feel it and sense it, I have invited few colleagues to provide exhibition descriptions. These descriptions go beyond the image based documentation of the exhibition or its review but try to explore what is there more for us and how we could talk, share these experiences in times of separation. Here we allow radical and intimate expansion of description of encounter we experience physically and finding ways to allow other distant bodies to explore relationship within the world beyond judgment. For this exercise I have invited artist Jasphy Zheng and curator Cai Qiaoling and I thank them for participation.  Biljana Ciric

Cai Qiaoling

Woman without Manifesto

I tried to describe to my friend R an exhibition I had seen. R is engaged in finance. She once studied in Europe, and is not unfamiliar with exhibitions in art galleries. However, contemporary art is the type of exhibition she rarely chooses to visit, even when she was in Europe. In my three years working in contemporary art, she has been curious about my field, but it was difficult for me to explain it to her. I therefore invited her to try \“visiting\“ an exhibition with me through my description.

May 23, 2021

In the morning, we boarded the high-speed train from different cities to attend the wedding of a friend. Except for occasionally replying urgent messages for work, I was for most of the time in the train ride attracted by the passing scenery outside. The train went northward along the southeast coast of China, passing through many neat and clean villages and towns. Amid lush green vegetation and lucid ponds with fish and geese, lines of village houses would suddenly appear, with ancient forms featuring flying eaves and grayish green bricks. I excitedly took photos and sent them to R, who told me that she was in an online meeting with her colleagues throughout the train ride and had no time to enjoy the beautiful scenery outside. R is always working overtime, even in her long exhausting trips.

The day before the wedding, as the bride’s friends, we helped to decorate the dream house, which was full of red balloons and red Chinese characters of “happiness”. The key task was to assemble a pile of small toys that were sourced from Taobao.com. According to the plan, on the next day, the groom and the best man group were to finish the game, to make some physical comedies for the visitors, and give the relatives and friends enough red envelopes with lucky money. Now these are just part of the rituals. Originally, they were meant to prove a man’s wealth, physique and intelligence, as well as show the bride’s value as an item for exchange.

On the next day, amid laughter, an iron-faced member of the best man group successfully overcame all the “deliberate obstacles” and completed all tasks with exceptional calmness. These rituals, which were meant to create joy, warmth and connection, did not interest him into the kind of performance that everyone expected. This best man, who graduated from the mathematics department in one of the top universities of China, seriously finished every game as if it was an International Mathematics Olympiad match for him to secure a place in the university. After all these rituals, the bride toasted the bridegroom’s parents and started to call them “Mom and Dad”. “I have always been unable to understand the feeling of getting married to someone and becoming family member with people in another family.” Said a friend to me, with his ever warm but distant smile.

Before the wedding banquet in the evening, the bridegroom hurriedly brought a red plastic bag. An important ceremony was not practiced in the morning — the bride was to put a red flower on the head of every female relative of the older generation in the bridegroom’s family. The maid of honor opened the plastic bag and saw butterfly-looking red headdress flowers tangled in a mess. She freed the flowers from the entanglement one by one, and was not happy with the fact that the headdress flowers were packed in a plastic bag. She then took the headdress box cover that the bride did not need for the time being, and laid the flowers on it neatly. When the older generation female relatives of the bridegroom’s family came to congratulate her, the bride took out the flowers from the box cover in an orderly manner, and gracefully returned the blessings of her aunts-in-law.

The MC of the wedding ceremony was proficient in creating the right atmosphere. In order to show how seriously the newly-wed couple treated their wedding, he said that the bride and bridegroom were preparing every detail of the wedding despite their overtime work a couple of days before, with the hope to leave each other with the best memories. In the long ceremony, even in the most realistic eyes, all the promises and loyalty of the couple were still touching. However, on the same night of the wedding, somebody immediately began to feel lost. The ceremony was only a brief escape from reality. What R needed to face is her work. But even work is an escape, when some other things are considered. Can she and her partner afford to buy an apartment in the city they live? What makes her hesitate so much about marriage after years with her partner?

While packing up, I could finally describe the exhibition to her:

This exhibition is entitled “Womanifesto”. It got started as a group of female artists felt that they were not supported by the art system, and gathered to help each other and provide support for each other’s work. In 2020, social distancing caused by the pandemic made people-to-people connection all the more valuable and urgent. Members of Womanifesto organized gatherings in different parts of the world.

Against the wall of the exhibition hall entrance you can find portfolios. You may use them to collect colorful pages scattered in the exhibition. These pages are the stories behind all the works you encounter in the exhibition, some are in the form of short stories and poems written by female artists. After the exhibition, the visitors may flip through these pages in the portfolio and create their own “exhibition” of the common living of women.

You will see simply-clipped brown paper hanging on the wall, with the kind words of the narrator on it, sharing with “dear visitors” the stories of every gathering. Upon entering the exhibition hall, you will be struck by a bamboo-roofed pavilion, on the table under which you find hand-sewn photo albums. You can feel the warm and clear texture of coarse cloth. Open the photo albums, and you will see women swimming in the pond, women chatting on vast green fields, women cheering together in a circle, and women strolling between the caves of Angkor Wat… You know these moments are not tranquil as they seem.  Although many stories took place in lush wilderness, none of these places are an ideal land of utopia.

Everywhere in the exhibition hall, one is reminded of the threats to life: illnesses of old age, spreading of the pandemic… And  there are reminders to the fragility of  the life of women and their squeezed living space: longing to win a lottery to get rid of debt crisis; the need for more income to support her father; invisible labor in family life… Do you see the color pottery placed on the white heart-shape cushion? The cushion is shaped in such a way to give soft support to her mother, who cannot sit for very long. And the painted pottery is to help her mother recover her cognition of color. You can even see the fingerprints from intimate touches. The difficulties in the life of every individual do not concern the individual only. To overcome difficulties, one has to live in a community.  Many of the exhibits in this exhibition are hardly artistic works. They are but objects, videos, words and images that try to lead your imagination to those moments of gathering. The colors, temperature, touch and sound also simulate those lively moments spent together in life. For instance, on a table surrounded by colorful cushions, there are handmade gloves, tableware for eating, hear-shape cushions woven with stretchy tatters, books and scarves that feel quite rough.

“I can understand that this exhibition hopes to create a sense of daily living by displaying some daily objects. I guess I know what this is about. But I just don’t seem to be able to empathise. The things you just talked about make me feel very far away. Perhaps that’s because the pandemic didn’t create too many obstacles in my life.”

While I didn’t have much presupposition about how she reacted, I felt quite surprised when I heard that she could not feel for the mutual support and gatherings of these women during the pandemic. She then shared with me an exhibition that she once visited and felt for. “It was an exhibition of the works by Filipino maids in Taiwan. The exhibition was also about storytelling about everyday life. There were photos and poems. It really touched my heart. I guess that’s because at that time I was a woman working and living in a place far from my home country.”

I realised that the reason for my failure was not that she cannot empathise with the life of others, but perhaps describing an exhibition is not an easy thing at all. The form of an exhibition features a set of complex relationships between time and space. How much can I describe in pictures and words? Be it accurate and exciting, or dull description, the linguistic and spatial re-creation presents a totally different experience for the receptor. No exhibition can be generalised into an anthology of articles, or a stack of photographs. Neither can those moments of gathering.

Our short reunion soon came to an end. I hope the next time we meet, with each other’s company, we will respond to the moments of gathering taking place in other parts of the world.

June 15, 2021

We visited Z together, who had just given birth to boy-girl twins. I had planned to tell her about “Womanifesto” too. She was staying in a medium-priced postpartum care center in Shenzhen, at a rate of 80,000 yuan for 40 days. That morning, it didn’t take R and I much time to choose a gift for the babies. But before that, we had a long discussion about the gift for the mother.

My hope was that the gift should have something to do with her hobby. This gift should only be about her, rather than remind her of her new motherhood. I remembered that she used to be good at dancing and playing musical instruments, and so did R and I. When we were girls, our mothers would love to cultivate their daughters into versatile people. “I don’t ask you to be good at it in the future, but at least you have some hobbies, and can use music or dance to express yourself”, or “I wanted to learn this when I was young, but I just didn’t have the support.” So our mothers said. In those days, in our mothers’ education practice, in addition to the reasons they felt strongly about, there was the label of “versatility” for an “outstanding” girl, so that she would not be a bookworm, but could be good at a few things, like a graceful young lady growing up in a traditional intellectual family. However, after her enrolment into the university, or perhaps even earlier than that, in the high school, neither dancing nor musical instrument was a means for Z to express or let go herself. She was no longer into music or dance. I remembered that she became a fan of Formula One, and Raikkonen. She even went to Shanghai several times for Formula One races. Unfortunate, after searching for quite some time on Taobao.com, I was not able to find any F1 franchise products that I could afford.

In the end, I chose skin care products. This seems to be yet another trap of consumerism, but the gift made her really happy. “Great! I just ran out of essence.” It was a relief that at least when she received the gift, she was thinking about her own need. “Is there anything different after giving birth?” “Yes there is. I can’t say what is different, but it just is different.”

Before I went to visit Z, I anticipated being unable to start a description about the exhibition to her. In the chitchat between friends about the chores, if I suddenly uttered, “I have visited an exhibition.” This would be really odd, as if one puts up a billboard for an entertainment star in an academic seminar on the Global South issues.

In the afternoon, R and I left. I thought I could have a chance to tell R more about the exhibition.

“Do you have to work this afternoon?”

“I don’t have to… I suppose I can work in the evening.”

On the way, her boyfriend, out of his goodwill to please me, suggested that we go to an exhibition. In the end, we didn’t go. She was “too sleepy”. Free time on weekends was really a luxury for her, and she wouldn’t like to spend the precious time standing, walking and trying to understand an exhibition that might be beyond her after all.

When we arrived at R’s home, her mother and her dog got up at the same time to meet us. Both her parents had retired. Now and then, they would spend some time with their daughter and her boyfriend, away from their place in the hometown, to cook for them, and help walk the dog when the two young people were too busy. Ever since R had this dog, we have had less time for a chat. Taking care of the dog is one of the most important tasks in her very limited free time. Like a parent that moves to a community with better education resources for better environment for the children, she spared no pains to move to an apartment near a park, for a better environment for dog walking. In the days when one is not ready to have offspring, an obedient dog seems to be “an inexpensive substitute” for children. The dog is a companion, and an adorable being. The dog may cost a lot of money, but certainly not to the level of the investment and risk of raising a child. R’s mother was busy getting me snacks and fruits, and poured me a cup of hot sesame tea from her hometown. She then enthusiastically started to prepare a meal and invited me to stay for dinner. With the care and company of her parents, and food from memories of her hometown, this feeling of home is what R could not do without. R works in a multinational corporation, but family and old friends remain her most important social network and support.  For the generation that was liberated from the collective, the word “community” simply does not have an equivalent in reality. It is hard to realise how the family becomes a small gear in a giant turbo, bears the pressure of constant revolving, and turns into the only support possible for every single tooth of the gear.  In a trade-off, she sometimes needs to respond to all the concerns of her parents, such as how, together with a boyfriend who is not as ambitious, she would purchase her own apartment, get married and raise her child, or that she has to retreat from a large table in the living room to her bedroom every midnight and continues her work there. When seeing her work overtime at night, her mother would get so worried and couldn’t go to sleep the whole night.

While I chatting with her mother, R fallen into sleep in the couch, murmuring “so tired”.

It suddenly occurred to me that this was exactly the reason for her saying “The things you just talked about are so far away from me”. Being busy and weary has turned the call for reflections and unity a kind of privilege, ignorance, and innocence, because one does not know what may have to be sacrificed for survival.

At 4:30 pm, I was to leave Shenzhen. I woke R up, said a quick goodbye to her. After all, we live in two cities so close to each other, with only half an hour high-speed train ride in between. Even with the reoccurrence of the Covid-19 epidemic in this region, it is possible to obtain the nucleic acid test result within 48 hours and travel between our cities, although I need to show my ID card and switch QR codes repeatedly on my journey to prove that I had no possibility of getting an inflection of Covid-19 in my previous trajectories. Here, things are still under good control of great will and efficiency. When I complained, R said, “This is a special period. You need to show your understanding.” Therefore, with such effective mechanism and cooperation, even sacrifice of the whole nation, it won’t be long before we can meet again.

The only thing is, in the end, just when and how will it not be so abrupt for me to naturally mention to my dear friend that I have visited an exhibition, one that is about how women accompanied and supported each other, and one that hopes to inspire people to survive and unite in difficulties?

没有宣言的女性

我尝试跟朋友R描述看过的一个展览。R从事金融行业，曾经在欧洲留学的经历，让她对美术馆的展览并不陌生，但是当代艺术是哪怕她在欧洲时也很少选择的展览。我在当代艺术行业工作的三年里，她对我所在的领域感到好奇又不解，而我也很难向她解释。我邀请她和我一起尝试去进入一个展览……

2021年5月23日

早上，我们分别从不同的城市登上高铁，去参加朋友婚礼。我在一列高铁上除了偶尔回复下紧急的工作，大部分时间都被窗外飞逝的风景吸引着。高铁一路顺着东南沿海往北去，路过许多村庄城镇，规整又干净，在草木丰茂、游鱼走鹅之间，有时候会突然出现一片片队列整齐的村屋，飞檐青砖，保持着古老的形制。我兴奋地给R发去这些照片，她告诉我，她在高铁上一路跟同事远程开会，无暇欣赏窗外飞逝的美景。她总在加班，哪怕是旅途劳顿之中。

婚礼前一天，我们作为新娘的朋友一起布置新房，满屋子的红气球、红喜字。关键是，还要组装一堆采购自淘宝的小玩具，第二天新郎和伴郎团要完成游戏，给全场制造些身体喜剧，给女方的亲朋好友足够彩头的红包，现在这些只是意思意思的仪式，最初是为了证明男方的财力、体力、智力，又可以展演新娘作为交换物的价值。

第二天在周围一片欢笑声里，伴郎团里有一位面无表情，异常冷静地顺利完成了所有的“刁难”，所有这些制造欢乐、温情和连结的仪式，完全激不起他表现出大家期待的样子 。他毕业于中国最好大学的数学系，认真地完成每一个游戏仿佛那是一场关乎大学升学的奥数比赛。新娘向新郎的父母亲敬酒，改口称“爸爸妈妈”。“我一直无法理解结婚这种，和另一个家庭的人们成为亲人的感觉。”一位朋友带着一如既往的亲切又有距离的微笑对我说道。

晚上婚宴前，新郎急急忙忙拿来一个红色塑料袋，早上忘记了一个重要的仪式，新娘要给每一位新郎家的女性长辈的头上别一朵小红花。伴娘打开塑料袋，看到好像小蝴蝶的红色头花乱糟糟地缠在一起。她把一朵朵头花从纠缠中解放出来，不满意这些头发居然装在一个塑料袋里，又拿来新娘暂时用不到的发冠盒盖找来，把小头花整整齐齐地摆放着。于是当新郎家的女性长辈们前来道贺，新娘从盒盖里有条不紊地拿出小花，优雅地回敬阿姨、婆婆们的祝福。

婚礼主持人熟练地烘托着气氛，为了表明新人对婚礼的重视，他说新郎新娘在婚礼前两天还在加班的情况下，仍然事无巨细地准备着婚礼，希望给彼此美好的回忆。在漫长的仪式里，在所有现实主义的眼睛里，新人互诉衷肠的誓言和忠诚也仍然真挚动人，而婚礼结束的那晚，有人立刻开始感到失落。庆典只是短暂地带人心安理得地逃离了现实。R需要面对的是工作，而相较于有些事，连工作都是逃避。自己和伴侣负担得起在这个城市买房吗？为什么与伴侣相处多年仍然对婚姻有诸多犹豫呢？

一边收拾行李，我终于可以一边跟她讲述展览：

这个展览叫“女性宣言”，最初是一些女性艺术家意识到女性艺术家缺少系统给予的支持，而聚集在一起，互相帮助，为彼此的创作提供支持。2020年在疫情的阻断下，人与人的连结显得更加珍贵和紧迫。这些女性艺术家联盟的成员，在世界各地发起了聚会。

展厅入口边的墙上，摆放着一本本的文件夹，你可以用文件夹收集散落在展览中的彩色书页。这些书页就是你在展览中所看到的所有作品的故事，女性艺术家们写的小说、诗歌，离开展览后，打开收集的书页，观众也可以自己再摆弄出一个关于女性的共同生活的“展览”。

你会看到墙上用简易的夹子挂着牛皮纸，牛皮纸上是一个讲述者亲切的声音，告诉“亲爱的观众”每一场聚会的故事。走进展厅，最显眼的就是竹屋顶的凉亭，凉亭下的桌子上摆放着手工缝制的相册，你可以摸到粗布那种温暖又清晰的纹理。翻开来：女人们在池塘里游泳，女人们面对着广阔的绿野交谈，女人们围坐在一起欢呼，女人们在层层叠叠的吴哥窟门洞里信步…… 要知道这些时刻并不是平静的，尽管许多故事都发生在郁郁葱葱的自然之中，但这些地方都不是世外桃源。

在展厅里，处处都在提醒着生命遭受的威胁：年老的病症、瘟疫的蔓延……提醒着女性生活的脆弱和被挤压的生存空间：渴望中得低下彩票摆脱债务危机、需要更多的收入来赡养父亲、家庭生活中的隐形劳动……看到白色的心形靠枕上摆放着一团团彩陶了吗？枕头的形状是为了给不便久坐的母亲提供柔软的支撑，彩陶是为了帮助母亲恢复对色彩的认知，亲密触摸的指纹清晰可见。每个个体的生活困境都不是只关于个人，去渡过困境的方式是在共同体中生活。这个展览展出的很多都称不上作品，而是用各种各样的物件、视频、文字、图像去尝试将你的想象带领到那些相聚的时刻，色彩、温度、触觉、声音也在模拟着那些生动的共同度过的日常时刻：在一个围绕着彩色坐垫的桌子上，摆放着做手工的手套、吃饭的餐具、碎布头编织的心形坐垫、质感粗粝的手工书和围巾。

“我可以理解这个展览希望营造日常的感觉，展示了一些日常的物件，也可以知道这个想说什么。但是我好像不太能够共情，你刚刚讲的这些东西让我觉得很遥远，也许是疫情好像没有给我带来太多的阻碍。”

我并没有设太多预设，但是当她对我说，无法对疫情期间女性的互助和聚会感到动情时，我还是颇感意外。她给我讲了一次她有共情的看展经历，“那是在台湾的菲佣自己的作品展，展览也是想要用日常的方式去讲这些故事，有摄影的、有写诗的，看了就很感动，因为当时我也是在异国他乡工作和生活的人。”

我意识到，并不是她无法对他人的生活共情，也许是因为描述展览本身不是一件容易的事情。展览的形式是一组时空关系的复合，而我通过图片和文字又能够描述多少？无论是精准的、精彩的，还是无趣的描述，语言的再现和时空的再现，对于接受者来说，都是完全不一样的体验。一个展览无法被提取为一本文章合集，一沓照片，那些相聚的时刻也是如此。

短暂的相聚不得结束了，我希望下一次见面时，在我们的彼此陪伴中去回应那些发生在世界上其他地方的相聚时刻。

2021年6月15日

我们一起去看望刚刚诞下一对龙凤胎的Z，原本我也计划向她讲述“女性宣言”。她住在一个深圳的中等价格月子中心，是40天8万。在这天早上，我和R迅速搞定了给宝宝的礼物。但是在此之前我们讨论了很久送给妈妈什么礼物。

我希望这个礼物和她自己的爱好有关，这个礼物只关于她，而不是提醒现在她是个母亲。我记得她曾经能歌善舞会乐器，我和R小时候也是如此，小时候我们的妈妈都乐意把女儿培养得“多才多艺”，“不求你以后多擅长，但是至少你有一些爱好，能够用音乐舞蹈乐器去抒发自己”，“我小时候就想学，但是没有条件”。当年妈妈们的培养里，除了她们明确意识到的理由，至少还有“多才多艺”是一个女孩“优秀”的标签，她不是一个只会考高分的书呆子，而是如同传统的那些优雅知性的大家闺秀，琴棋书画都会一点。不过自从上了大学甚至早在高中，这些并没有成为Z日常表达自己或者放松心情的途径，她也不是一个音乐迷或者舞蹈迷了。我记得她喜欢F1 方程式赛车，喜欢莱科宁，F1在上海的赛事，她去看过好几次。可惜我在淘宝上搜索了一圈也没有看到我能够负担得起的周边。

最后还是选择了护肤品，这看起来又像是一个消费主义的陷阱，不过这礼物实实在在让她开心：“太好了，我正好没有精华用了。”至少，在收到这个礼物时，她想起的是自己。“生了孩子有什么不一样吗？”“不一样了，说不上是什么不一样，但就是不一样了。”

在来之前，我就预料到，也许我没有办法开口向Z描述展览。当我在朋友们家长里短的对话里，突然插一句，“我看过一个展览”，就仿佛在一个讨论全球南方的研讨会上，突然举起一个选秀明星的应援牌。

午后，我和R离开，我想有机会，可以再跟R多讲讲展览。

“你下午要加班吗？”

“可以不加……可以晚上再加。”

在路上她的男友投我所好地建议，要不要去看个展览。最终我们没有去看，她“太困了”。周末仅有一点点闲暇时间，并不愿意去站着、走着，花费精力理解很可能看不懂的展览。

一进家门，R的妈妈和R的狗狗同时起来迎接我们。她的爸爸妈妈已经退休，时不时会从老家到这里住上一两个月，给她和男朋友做做饭，在两个年轻人忙不过来的时候，帮忙遛遛狗。自从养了这只小狗后，我们闲聊的时间更少了，因为在她为数不多的空闲时间里，照顾小狗是最重要的任务之一。为了给小狗一个舒适的遛弯环境，她不惜费尽心力搬到附近有公园的公寓楼，比得上那些为了给孩子良好的成长环境而搬到学区房的父母。在还没有准备好生育后代的时候，听话的小狗似乎也是孩子的“平价替代”，它是陪伴，是可爱的小生命，也花费不菲，但是远远比不上养育一个孩子的投入和风险。R的妈妈忙前忙后地给我端出零食水果，倒上一杯家乡特色的芝麻热茶，热情地开始准备晚饭留我一起吃。这是R眷恋的家的感觉，有父母的照顾和陪伴，有家乡记忆的食物。尽管在一个跨国公司工作，家庭和老友仍然是她最重要的社会支持和人际关系，“community”这个词语对于这一代从集体中被解放的人来说，没有办法找到另外一种对应的现实。很难觉察到，家庭如何成为一个大涡轮里的小齿轮，承担着不断旋转卷动的压力，又成为每一个锯齿几乎唯一可以想象得到的依靠。只是有时候她需要应对父母的各种忧虑，比如如何和事业心稍逊自己的男友在一座生活成本高昂的城市买房结婚养孩子，比如每天到了晚上12点，她必须从客厅宽敞的桌子上撤退到睡房里，继续加班，因为妈妈会因为看到她加班而担忧得整晚失眠。我忽然意识到，“你讲的那些离我太遥远”的更重要原因是在这里，忙碌和疲惫，它让那种对于反思和团结的召唤，变得仿佛是一种特权、无知和天真，因为不知为了生存必须牺牲什么。

而此时，R在沙发上咕哝着“好困啊”，逐渐熟睡。

4点半，我要离开深圳了，唤醒R，简单告别。毕竟我们相信，生活相隔这么近的两座城市，高铁只需要半个小时，即使在疫情复发的时候也可以48小时内出核酸检测结果继而在两座城市中旅行，尽管一路上需要反复地拿出身份证、切换二维码证明我的轨迹清清白白与新冠病毒的毫无遭遇的可能。在这里，一切都仍然以巨大的意志和效率控制着，我抱怨的时候，R说“现在是特殊时期，你理解一下” 。 所以，如此这般高效的系统、举国的配合和牺牲，我们下一次见面一定不会相隔太久。

只是，最后，我该在什么时间什么场合，怎样才能不突兀地跟我亲爱的朋友自然而然地说起，我看了一场展览，它关于女性如何彼此陪伴和支持，它希望启发人们如何在困境中生存和团结。

Cai Qiaoling is an observer and collector in the world of contemporary art, and sometimes goes on excursions to somewhere else.